Dear Family,
Our anniversary came and went with little fanfare. We bought a small box of chocolate covered nuts to munch on last evening and 16 pieces of baklava to take to church meetings today so that we could spread the joy with the three people who came (besides ourselves; the father with two children did not come because of some problem with water in the apartment). We didn't buy cards for each other because we didn't know whether we would be purchasing a card of congratulations for getting out of a beauty salon with our hair intact. You know, the usual kind of card.
We will try to go to a nice place for dinner Monday evening. I was able to garner a few suggestions of nice restaurants from an acquaintance who lives and works in the area. Most were of places that specialize in fish dishes.
Because the fellow with the two children did not come to church services, and he had agreed to talk, I had to fill in. So immediately after the sacrament I pointed to the JST excerpts from Mark 14 that are printed in the back of the LDS edition of the Bible. I didn't have my copy of the Bible, but another fellow did. So I asked him to read the selections from Mark that have to do with the last supper. (It was the first time that he had ever known that JST materials were in the back of his Bible.) I made the point that, in all the accounts of the last supper, we miss the immediacy of the Passover experience when celebrants are as if they are in Egypt and are, at that moment, coming out of there with Moses. None of that feeling is in the gospels' accounts. But in the JST Mark passages, the immediacy is there. It just comes in the form of Jesus asking his apostles to think of their time with him that night the next time they perform the sacrament ordinance. And the next time. And the next time. They will all be as if they are back with him in the upper room, celebrating the transformation of the Passover into the sacrament. So too, we might think of being in that room with the Savior as we partake of the sacrament each Sunday.
Here are some of my musings on our anniversary. They are kind of long. Happy reading!
***
It started in the MTC. Our togetherness that is. We began to ask whether one of us should leave a room without the other. Or step inside the lunch room without the other. We were still pretty independent at that point. So if one us had to go in a different direction, we did not insist that the other go along. But the question of togetherness was always lurking around the corner. There were times, of course, during our training that the Elders in our group were separated from the Sisters. But those training sessions did not raise the togetherness question. But the idea of serving a mission with one another did.
The issue of togetherness really arose the day after our arrival in the country. One of the SVs volunteered to take us to an interesting part of town where the old mosques and churches are located. Because the SV guide was a female, Gayle couldn’t very well opt out and send me forth. So she went. And had a smashing good time, with the emphasis on "smashing." She was completely tuckered out by the time we sat down on a boat for a ride up the Bosphorus. After that ride, and a metro ride back to the general neighborhood where we were staying, we still had to walk a fair distance to reach the apartment. Although I thought at the time that this was a good way to keep us from just wandering around in the fog of jet lag, it involved a tremendous effort just to make it through such a day. And there was no way that she could go off to do something by herself and I by myself. After all, we were in a totally strange city that we had visited twenty-seven years earlier with children. And we needed each other so that we could get lost together. Or some such thing.
The cruncher came almost a week later on the day we moved into our apartment. At the end of a long day, we were finally alone together with the need to clean ourselves up and go out to meet one of the SVs for dinner at a place a mile away via the only route that we knew to that point. We had to walk the whole distance together, at Gayle’s speed. She was exhausted. So we didn’t go fast. That walk, to the restaurant and back, was a defining moment for me. I knew that I couldn’t just set the pace or walk off by myself. We had to stay together. She was not going to window shop by herself at her pace and I was not going to go off to do something else by myself. It was a matter of going together or not at all.
For much of our married life, we had moved rather independently of each other. And that situation became even more pronounced after our children left home. We owned two cars, except when we owned three. That meant she could go where she needed to go without involving me in the least in her activities. I could do the same. When I went to clean the church building with members of the high priests group, she did not tag along. On the contrary, she wanted no part of that action. When she had a church meeting, I didn’t go with her. And so forth and so on.
Now, what I find myself doing much of the time is walking behind Grandma. This action serves two purposes. First, the walkways along the streets are usually narrow between the cars (parked or moving) and the buildings and fenced off areas. So it is difficult to walk side by side. Second, she walks more slowly than most of the other walkers on the sidewalks. And walking behind her serves as a buffer to on-coming foot traffic from our rear. It does me little good to walk in front of her. If I do, I find myself stopping constantly to allow her to catch up. And she has ideas about what she wants to see and write down (she carries a pen and paper to write Turkish words that interest her). So I walk behind her at her moderate to slow pace, something that I have done only rarely in our married life. This pattern is now my constant companion, to borrow an expression, an aspect that has surprised me. And made me change my thinking.
The only times that we can really walk together are when we are in one of the city’s pedestrian malls or the boardwalk along the bay where people walk at varying speeds. Even then, we are constantly watching out that we don’t bump into people or people don’t bump into us. Walking together always means that we are walking at a speed slower than the other foot traffic around us. I have occasionally tried to speed up our pace as we walk arm in arm. My attempts have failed. Grandma has her own pace and that’s that.
Very occasionally Grandma walks as she used to walk, setting off like a house on fire. But then she pays for it big time. The heat and humidity sap her energy for the rest of the day. She recovers best in the presence of one of our air conditioners.
* * *
Almost every time Grandma and I go somewhere, we find ourselves in a big conversation about the best way to go. And since the number of streets are seemingly endless around here, going this way and that, a case can be made for almost any direction and any street. And this conversation will happen several times a day. The only times we ever used to get in such discussions back home was when she would be driving the two of us on a short trip, say, to Lehi. But that was it. Once or twice in a week. Now, the conversations just keep coming and coming, obviously with no end in sight. At least not for another sixteen months or so. I can hardly wait — for more conversations of course (what were you thinking?).
* * *
The upshot is that our lives together have taken a big turn. I am not sure which way all this will lead. But togetherness is the new watchword, whatever consequences may come. I have decided that, in the end, in contrast other experiences, all this has endeared Grandma to me even more. So there.
I love you and pray for each of you.
Grandpa Brown
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